Braid: Kenney’s 8 transition leaders have deep government experience

The transition from one government to another sounds easy — your turn, here’s the keys — but it’s actually incredibly complex. Skilful handling is a huge factor in later government performance.Premier-designate Jason Kenney has put together a transition team with strong emphasis on past experience in the Alberta government, both on the political and bureaucratic sides.This is a nuts-and-bolts crew charged by Kenney with getting the UCP ready to govern, and fast.One surprising choice is Shirley McClellan, former minister of almost everything in the era of PC premier Ralph Klein.She served six terms in senior ministerial roles, from finance to health, agriculture, intergovernmental affairs . . . it’s a long list. Klein used to say she was the smartest person in his government, including himself.McLellan was a fiscal hawk in those cost-cutting days. She went through all the demonstrations and resistance to Klein’s decision to cut public service salaries by five per cent.Kenney might value that experience, but also McLellan’s unmatched knowledge of everything that can go wrong, or right, with a premier’s cabinet and government.The transition list is quite un-partisan, or at least, not militantly partisan.One member I wouldn’t have expected is Mike Percy, a former Liberal MLA who in 2014 became chief of staff to former PC premier Jim Prentice.A business professor at the U of A, Percy was finance critic for Liberal leader Laurence Decore after the 1993 election. He’s a policy expert who’s also deeply knowledgeable about how government works.Kenney has charged the transition chair, David Knight Legg, with ensuring both a smooth transition and a blunder-free launch in the legislature, which will open May 21.Knight Legg, an international business expert and friend of Kenney for more than 20 years, has been involved in policy development for months.The UCP was communicating with provincial officials long before the election.The New Democrats gave Marcia Nelson, the deputy minister of executive council, permission to talk to Kenney’s people, which she did.That was charitable — even public-spirited — considering that the NDP, not expecting to win in 2015, didn’t do any transition work of its own until a week before the election. It’s one reason Rachel Notley’s government got into trouble with early legislation like Bill 6, the farm safety law.Today, the officials helping the UCP team “are doing a fantastic job,” says Knight Legg. “They’re just exceptionally professional. Albertans should be proud of their public service.”Related
The transition group also includes four former civil servants with wide experience in running departments and policy.One is Tim Grant, who was a legendary figure in the Alberta civil service.As a senior military officer, he served tours in Bosnia and Afghanistan, where he was commander.Grant joined the civil service in 2008, handling premier Ed Stelmach’s carbon capture and storage program as well as response to the 2011 Slave Lake fires. He quickly rose to deputy minister of transportation and then justice.Grant Sprague, a former deputy minister of energy, is well-known to the industry; Lennie Kaplan, an expert in fiscal planning, worked for former finance minister Lyle Oberg and also, at one point, Mike Percy.There’s also a former deputy finance minister from B.C., Athana Mentzelopoulos, who worked in the regimes of Liberal premiers Gordon Campbell and Christy Clark.Rounding out the transition group is Amber Griffith, a human-resources expert who worked with Kenney’s caucus, Global Public Affairs, and as recruitment co-ordinator for Imperial’s Kearl oilsands project.One of her key jobs is to oversee hiring of all the communications staffers, issues managers and other political aides for ministers’ offices. Her name is the one legions of out-of-work conservative operatives have been waiting to hear.Also heavily involved, according to Knight Legg, are Kenney’s chief of staff, Jamie Huckabay, and principle secretary Howard Anglin.As for Kenney himself, he’s deep into selection of cabinet ministers. They all have to be lined up and ready to smile by next Tuesday’s swearing-in.After that, it’s three weeks of solid work before the legislature opens.The UCP ministers will face a unique Alberta challenge — an Opposition that knows more about the government than they do.Don Braid’s column appears regularly in the Heralddbraid@postmedia.comTwitter: @DonBraidFacebook: Don Braid Politics